


Moments Along a Journey

by ClanlessSoro (13thSyndicate)



Series: FFXIV: Brotherhood [1]
Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Brotherhood, Brotherly and family relationships, Dark Knight WoL, Drabbles, Dragoon WoL, Gen, Multiple Warriors of Light, Original Warrior of Light - Freeform, Red Mage WoL, Shenanigans, Sibling Bonding, Tags Are Hard, headcanons, if there's major spoilers in it it'll be in the summary or notes on the chapter, moments in time, multiclass WoL, multiple short fics, some are silly some are sad, some chapters contain spoilers
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-18
Updated: 2020-03-31
Packaged: 2021-02-25 20:35:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,305
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21851551
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/13thSyndicate/pseuds/ClanlessSoro
Summary: "One of these days, they're going to realize there's two of us."Sorocan Clanless and his adoptive brother, E'stai Tia of the Sun-seeker Miqo'te, face many trials on their journey as the Warriors of Light, but through it all, they realize the most important thing they have is each other. These are moments in time from their travels.
Relationships: Warrior of Light and OC
Series: FFXIV: Brotherhood [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1574293
Kudos: 3





	1. Mistaken Identities

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Aesir23](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aesir23/gifts).



> E'stai and Soro are characters belonging to Aesir23 and me and are our respective mains. Adoptive brothers, we have a lot of silly headcanons for them, and I hope you enjoy reading about them.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> People seem incapable of figuring out this very basic fact.

“You mean – you've _seen_ the Warrior of Light?!”

The exclamation rang out through the Aetheryte plaza of Ishgard, attracting no small amount of attention to the Hyuran man making the statement. A few Elezen turned elegant, long-eared heads to listen in, along with some of the few adventurers that had begun making their way into the city-state following the official end of the Dragonsong War.

“That's right!” said the Elezen the Hyur was speaking with. “I saw him in the company of Count Fortemps just the other day! He was a huge, beast of a man, wearing dragoon's armor, with a lance as big as any three Hyur strapped to his back. It's true what they say, he looks like a dragon, though I suppose he must be one of those Aura people you hear about-”

“What?” exclaimed another onlooker. “No, you must be mistaken,” they added, a Hyuran woman in the garb of one of the poor residents of the Brume. The Elezen making the statement had also been dressed as a lowborn, though one at least fortunate enough to live outside the slums, or else she might not have had the courage to speak. “The Warrior of Light saved my life, and I tell you, he was a Miqo'te gentleman, all smiles and with the softest fur! And he didn't carry a lance or fight like a dragoon, he wore a rapier and wielded magic in battle!”

“That can't be right. You must be deluded, dear girl!” the Elezen retorted.

“Indeed!” interrupted another. “I, too, was saved by the Warrior of Light, and he was a dragoon!”

“No, he wore two knives and fought like a Doman!” disagreed a fourth.

By this point, more than a few had turned their eyes to the slowly-escalating argument. One of the adventurers, a young Miqo'te himself, cleared his throat, stepping into the middle of the argument. His wavy black hair fell into his eyes at a rakish angle, dyed green at the tips in the latest fashion. He flicked his tai back and forth with a smile on his face.

“No, no,” he said. “See, you guys? You've both got it _all_ wrong. The Warrior of light is _obviously_ neither of those things. He's got the head of a dragon and the _tail_ of a cat, just like a Miqo'te. We call them Au'rote, see, where I come from? And he's got the claws of a kobold, too, and porcupine spikes, but he hides them under all his armor, see? Yeah. It's totally true, I know him and _everything._ We adventurers know stuff, it gets around.”

Everybody stared at the young, catlike man in confused bewilderment.

“Come on, lil' bro,” he said to his companion, an Au Ra wearing dragoon armor, before dragging him off. “I think they were looking for some guys to go clear out a dungeonor something. Important adventurer business, no civilians allowed, autographs later, buh-bye!”

The crowd simply stared at them as the young cat-man dragged his companion along into the snowy afternoon.

* * *

A few hours later, over a meal at the tavern, the Miqo'te's companion finally spoke.

“That wasn't very nice, E'stai,” he admonished. “Besides... I heard them go back to arguing after we left...”

E'stai, the Miqo'te, snorted to himself. “They deserve it,” he said, licking dodo stew off hisfingers, resting his boots on the table and beginning to go about cleaning the long rapier that had been concealed under his coat. “I tell you, Soro.... one day they're gonna figure out there's two of us.”

Sorocan Clanless, Warrior of Light (the first), sighed, shook his head, and speared a chunk of roast dodo, leaving his adoptive brother to his imaginings.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was the first E'stai and Soro short I wrote and apparently Aesir spent several minutes laughing her butt off before telling me this was exactly E'stai's personality. I love our adorable dorks.
> 
> The reference to fighting like a Doman is because E'stai is currently leveling NIN, though his main class is RDM.


	2. Brotherly Love

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> E'stai's an idiot and Soro's dragoon armor is ridiculous.

“What. Is _that._ ”

The familiar Miqo'te in front of me was barely holding back the fit of laughter I could see quivering in his gut and the swish of his tail. He was currently half-climbed over my shoulder, inspecting the back of my armor, and I felt a blush darken the skin of my cheeks, probably causing my unsightly freckles to stand out even more against my skin.

“It's. It's a dragon tail,” I mumbled, glancing off to the side. “They... they said it was _traditional._ ”

“You've already got a perfectly good tail,” E'stai replied, bodily hoisting himself onto my shoulder to hang, upside-down, off my back, his own tail waving in my face. “I don't see it though, which is good, because that would be sil.... oh my Twelve. Please. Please tell me your tail isn't.”

I put my face in one hand. “Stai....”

“It _is._ Isn't it a little _small?_ Your tail is like, the size of my head. Okay, no, it's not that big, but still. Does it hurt?” He tugged (gently, at least) on the armored 'tail' sticking stiffly out the back of my armor, giggles starting to sneak in between his words. “Oh my gods. Soro, you look _ridiculous._ ”

I buried my face further into my hands and let out a groan as my older 'brother' dissolved into a fit of laughter, still folded over one of my shoulders, his boots kicking my chestplate and his tail threatening to make me sneeze.

“They didn't have time to fit it properly. At least they made it more than a decoration. They don't make armor for Au Ra. They don't know much about our tails....”

E'stai continued dying, his fist pounding into my back, and I contemplated throttling him.

“Look, when you finish _your_ training with Ser Alberic, they're going to stick _your_ tail in one of these, and I'm going to _laugh at you!”_

He paid not a single heed to my words until I picked him up off my shoulder by the collar and dropped him face-first in the Coerthas snow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did you know the lvl 60 Dragoon armor turns off an Au Ra's tail? I came up witht his headcanon and Aesir told me E'stai would never stop making fun of Soro for it, so I had to write something dumb.


	3. Darkness

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After a harrowing encounter, Soro finally tells E'stai what really happened with Fray.
> 
> Contains spoilers for the DRK level 50 questline!

“You seem really upset,” E'stai said to me in camp that night, as I lay staring up at the stars, feeling for the first time in a long time the weight of the Other in my heart. “Is everything... okay...? You haven't been yourself since you went to go meet with Fray.” His tail flicked back and forth with worry, and I sighed, shaking my head.

“I.... I don't know if I can talk about it,” I said, honestly. I might have held back with any other person, but for all that we weren't even the same race, E'stai was my brother.

“You don't have to,” he said seriously, sitting down next to me. “But, you know... it helps sometimes.”

I took a deep breath. Let it out.

“.....Fray,” I said softly. “He's dead.”

“Oh,” he replied.

“He was never alive.”

“...Oh?” His eyebrow raised skeptically. Trust Stai to be able to be skeptical after everything we'd seen on this journey. I put a hand over my heart, felt it beat inside of me.

“I wanted a mentor and he was there. That's what he said, anyway. That I... made him. The real Fray died and was tossed out with the garbage, just as we heard the first time. The thing pretending to be him....” I stopped. I couldn't go on, I couldn't. My heart thudded painfully against my ribs.

“It's okay,” E'stai said. “Take your time. What is it she keeps saying to us again....? Hear. Feel...”

“...Think.” I smiled, just a little, and took a deep breath then another.

I opened my mouth, and the words just... fell out.

Everything that had happened, from the first time Fray and I saved a poor young woman on the street to the very end as the lines between us began to blur dangerously. When he spoke the words my mouth wouldn't say; when his sword licked out while I kept mine sheathed. When he urged me, onward and onward, inward and inward, to unleash everything dark in me, every hatred I had ever felt, every grievance I had ever had. The rage at the circumstances behind my name, coming together into a great ball of darkness that had threatened to swallow me.

I told him of how I faced that darkness, the mirror reflection of myself, on the battlefield, sword to sword, until I conquered it at last.

Then I stopped again.

“So what happened next...?” he prodded, one hand on my shoulder. “What did you do?”

I stared up at the stars for a long while, silent and still.Then, closing my eyes and bowing my head, as he had, in defeat, I told him the truth.

“I accepted him,” I said softly. “I let him back into my heart. He seemed so sad, so lonely... so angry... I couldn't just... leave him there. I made him, Stai. To kill him would be to kill a part of myself. I.... I couldn't.” I turned away. “Do you... think less of me...?”

“I could never,” he said, putting his hand on my shoulder. “Besides... I think that kindness, the kindness that let you accept him, and not give in...? I think that's your greatest strength.”

I smiled at him, gratefully, and turned back to watching the stars.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This quest messed me up and I'm not ashamed to admit it. On the other hand, I think it was one of my favorites so far. Also, your first look at serious!E'stai and serious!Soro; there'll probably be more of these as I unpack my Heavensward feels.


	4. Those Who Live

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> One night on the Sea of Blades, Soro reflects on what he's lost. E'stai tries to help him come to terms with his feelings.

The wind echoed across the plains, an eerie but musical refrain, as the Warriors of Light made camp for the night on the Sea of Blades. For one of them, this brought back memories too old to place, of the voice of the wind and the tribe's traditional instruments blending with the voice of a mother he couldn't quite remember. Sorocan Clanless' face was uncharacteristically closed off; even the introverted younger brother usually had some kind of expressio, but now he was sealed as tight as the secrets of the clans they had come to entreat.

E'stai, worried about his brother, friend, and partner-in-heroism, reached out with the stick he'd been using to tend the fire and prodded Soro gently.

“Hey,” he said, accompanied by another, more insistent poke. “Hey. Bro. Gil for your thoughts?”

“Hm?” Soro asked, looking up, before dropping his eyes and shaking his head. “Oh. Nothing. I'm alright.”

He was rewarded by another poke in the side.

“Ow! Stai, cut it out.”

“Not until you tell me what's bothering you,” E'stai replied.

“I told you, nothing is- ow!” He rubbed his side, directing a half-hearted glare at his brother, before letting out a deep sigh. “It's just...” He glanced around himself, eyes hungrily drinking in the sight of nothing, as far as the eye could see, until the looming form of the Dawn Throne cut across the landscape. “This place,” he said softly. “It's.... I was born here, you know. I wasn't old enough to remember it, so the memories can't be real. But it feels familiar. It calls to me. I am Xaela,” he said softly. “This is where I was born to be.”He chuckled, shaking his head. “It's a strange feeling. I mean, the only other Xaela I ever meet are fellow adventurers, and most of them don't even keep to the old ways. Deis doesn't use a clan name, I'm not sure of Hisoki's origins...” He named two members of the Free Company he and E'stai belonged to. “Suddenly I am surrounded by people who look like me, were raised like me, lived like I lived, keep the ways my parents kept before they died. It's... a strange feeling, even more so because of how strange and alien it is after having been apart for so long.”

E'stai didn't say anything, just let Soro talk. Even when he paused, as if waiting for E'stai to chime in, the Miqo'te shook his head.

“Go on,” were his only words, and Soro nodded.

“I just... they look at me as though I am a stranger. They talk to me as though I know nothing of their ways, even though I am Xaela like them. What if they're right? What if I am no longer Xaela? Even my name... I am Clanless.” His eyes were distant and haunted. “I chose this name for myself. But, seeing them all... I never realized how much it hurt until I was surrounded by them.”

E'stai nodded. “Like if I changed my name to Stai,” he said. “It's my name. But it's taking a part of myself away from me. I get it.” He paused. “You know...” he said, hesitantly. “You know, you never talk about them. Your clan, I mean. What they were like. All of these different tribes have such different beliefs it makes my head spin, you know? I can't help but wonder what kinds of crazy superstitions you have that you've never told me about. I mean, that one guy in Reunion was married to _his horse._ ”

Sorocan laughed, shaking his head. “The Goro have always been a bit.... odd,” he replied, a small smile replacing his downcast expression. “I'll admit I only know a little about each of the tribes, but I guess I can tell you about mine.” He stared off into the distance. “I'll tell you the way our tribe's Udgan taught us, so that her words will not be forgotten,” he added, with a decisive nod. Then, closing his eyes, he listened to the wind, trying to recall that long-ago day.

“I was five winters old, when I first heard this story,” he said. “And when my son or daughter is five winters, I will take them before the Udgan so they may learn. Xaela are born of the steppe, and to the steppe our bodies return. Yet our souls burn ever-bright under the watch of Mother Nhaama, who bore us. Many tribes believe different things of the soul. The Kagon believe that Azim will steal their soul if they are ever touched by sunlight; the Orl – rest their bodies beneath the moon – once believed that Nhaama would carry them to her bosom and their souls would become the stars. The Dotharl believe that the soul burns brightest in battle, and that a Dotharl who dies in battle will be reborn 'fore the beginning of the next season of their death. But none of these tribes are ours, little one. We are the Nasaan; the Ones who Live. Once, we were Undying Ones, of the Dotharl, and believed as they did. But Mother Nhaama came to our first Udgan in a dream, and bade him look around him at the other tribes. She gave him eyes to see their souls' burning. The Dotharl believe that the soul only burns in battle, but the first Nasaan saw that a soul burns in all passion – in love, in creation, in peace as well as war. To ignite the soul one must ignite the heart. He was laughed at by the Dotharl, who see craftsmen as a necessary evil, best left to other tribes. To shun battle as a Dotharl is to truly die. So the first Nasaan went to others, to those who would listen to his words, and some felt the same fire as he did, and saw with the eyes of Nhaama. And so they followed. Then the first Nasaan went to the other tribes, to the Goro who marry horses and the Gharl the soil-bearers and the Kha who dancewith strangers, and taught them of what he had learned, and asked them to join him and never truly die. And once again, some felt he same fire, and saw with the eyes of Nhaama, and followed him. And then they all came together to decide who would be Khatun, and who would be Udgan, and the Nasaan were born. And when a child is born to the Nasaan, we bring them to the Udgan, who sees with the eyes of Nhaama still, and they tell us whose soul burns within the child. And we rejoice, for our best are returned to us, not only those who die in the fires of war, but those who lived in the fires of passion. And they receive the same name, as was done when we were still Dotharl, so they may remember who they were in time. So if you are ever blessed to return to the Steppe where our kind were born, little one, remember these words, for once upon a time, your soul was there, as were ours all. And when the men of iron and fire are driven from Othard, we will return. For we, the Nasaan, will never die.”

The last words stuck in Soro's throat, and he clenched his eyes shut against the tears that threatened to well up in them. “But they did,” he said, his voice suddenly raw with emotion he'd never expressed. “They all died. All of them but me, E'stai. I don't know the rites to beckon a soul back when it's time to come. I don't see with the eyes of Nhaama. We were supposed to all live forever, but one man is not a tribe. We were driven out of our homes to lands we knew nothing about, and we _died_ there. Mine was the last generation to hear the Udgan's words before the Ishgardians came. Before the plague came. My family... they were the last, you know. My mother died with the knowledge that she would never be reborn, because there was no longer a tribe to be reborn into, and she still died smiling because I was getting better. Because I would live.”

He'd thought he was over the guilt, he thought to himself as E'stai silently wrapped his arms around him and comforted him. It was years ago, and he had a new family, E'stai's tribe, to look after him and make him feel like he belonged. He knew it wasn't his fault, and still – now that he was talking about it, all of his emotions were pouring out of him, emotions he'd thought long since over and dealt with.

For a long while, E'stai was silent, not really knowing how to help Soro through the feelings he'd always known still ate at him. Then, determined to at least try and help, he looked Soro in the eye.

“Look,” he said, clearing his throat. “One person might not be a tribe. But in your story, your tribe was started by oone person who had a dream. Look around you, Soro. You're here. You're back on the steppe where you were born, driving out the 'men of iron and fire'. You're the Warrior of Light! One of them, anyway,” he added, his tail flicking jokingly. “Maybe you don't know the rites or the spells or have the special vision, but you're still one of your people. Maybe... maybe you can fulfill your Udgan's prophecy after all. If anyone can do it, it's you, right?”

Soro stared at E'stai for a moment. “You... really think so?” he asked.

“Yeah, of course I do. You're _my_ brother, you know. You can do anything.” He thought for a moment, and then a slow grin spread across his face.

“....what is it?” Soro asked, warily, suddenly worried by E'stai's mischievous expression.

“Welllll,” he said, elbowing Soro in the side. “I guess there's _something_ I can do to help you...”

“....and what would that be?” Soro's tone was still suspicious, perhaps even more so.

“Well. If your problem is that one person isn't a tribe and there's nobody being born for your tribe to be reborn as....... I guess I just need to teach you the ways of wooing women, then, don't I? After all, you need a girlfriend so all those little Soros can run around with the souls of their ancestors inhabiting them!”

For a moment, Sorocan Clanless just stared at his brother, as though he couldn't quite process what E'stai's cheekily grinning face was saying.

Then he let out a large groan and threw a bedroll at his fellow warrior of light, flopping onto the ground and deciding that that was his cue to get some well-needed sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some of this is a rehash of the infodump that I wrote in The Nasaan, but it was important for Soro to tell his clan's story in his own words. And then E'stai goes and ruins it because I needed a laugh after writing that.


End file.
